Josef Locke

Josef Locke was the stage name of Joseph McLaughlin (23 March 1917 – 15 October 1999), a tenor singer who was successful in the United Kingdom and Ireland in the 1940s and 1950s. Born in Derry, he was the son of a butcher and cattle dealer, and one of nine children. He started singing in local churches in the Bogside at the age of seven, and as a teenager added two years to his age to enlist in the Irish Guards, later serving abroad with the Palestine Police Force, before returning in the late 1930s to join the Royal Ulster Constabulary. Known as The Singing Bobby, he became a local celebrity before starting to work the UK variety circuit, where he played 19 seasons in the northern English seaside resort of Blackpool. The renowned Irish...